This map of southeastern Europe and the eastern Mediterranean was made early in World War II by Fremde Heere Ost (Foreign Armies East), a unit of the German army general staff responsible for intelligence about the armies of the Soviet Union, Scandinavia, certain Balkan countries, Africa, and the Far East. The map shows country boundaries in bold, dark purple. Also shown are oil pipelines, wells and other sources of water, and important roads, railroads, and canals. Many of the countries of this region were involved in the war. Italian and ...

This map of the Near and Middle East was compiled in 1940 by the Geographical Section of the General Staff of the British Army and published by the War Office of the British government in 1941. The map shows topographic relief by gradient tints and indicates railroads, principal roads, secondary roads, caravan routes and tracks, the names and boundaries of provinces and districts, and deserts, rivers, swamps, and other topographic features. Towns and cities are classified and shown by categories, from first (capitals) to fifth in importance. Also shown are ...

This map, published in Berlin in July 1916, shows the Turkish theater of World War I. It is based on an 1884 map in French of the Asian provinces of the Ottoman Empire by German geographer and cartographer Heinrich Kiepert (1818–99). The map contains additional notes in German and its coverage of existing and projected railroads is updated to 1916. The Ottoman territories, shown in pink, include present-day Turkey, Cyprus, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan, as well as Saudi Arabia. The Ottoman Empire, or Turkey as it was ...

This 1833 map in Latin shows the conquests of Alexander the Great (356–323 BC), whose empire stretched from present-day Greece through Turkey and the Middle East to Afghanistan. In 326 BC Alexander set out to conquer India, but he was stymied when his exhausted armies mutinied on the banks of the Hyphasis River (now known as the Beas River) in northern India. The map shows the cities that Alexander founded and named after himself, including Alexandria Arachosia (Kandahar, Afghanistan), Alexandria Ariana (Herat, Afghanistan), Alexandria, Egypt, and many others. Place-names ...

Alexander the Great (356–323 BC) died suddenly at the age of 32, leaving no apparent heir or appointed successor. Some 40 years of internecine conflict followed his death, as leading generals and members of Alexander’s family vied to control different parts of the vast empire he had built. The Battle of Ipsus, fought in Phrygia, Asia Minor (present-day Turkey) in 301 BC between rival successors, resulted in the empire’s irrevocable dissolution. This late-19th century map in Latin shows the four main kingdoms that emerged after the battle ...

The note in Italian in the cartouche in the lower left-hand corner of this map states that it was “described on the basis of the most exact maps and with the direction of the most recent news by Giacomo Cantelli da Vignola, subject and geographer of the Most Serene Master the Duke of Modena and published by Giovanni Giacomo de Rossi in his printing house at the [Via della] Pace with the authorization of the Pope. Year 1689.” Giacomo Cantelli da Vignola (1643−95) was an Italian geographer and cartographer ...

Gerard Mercator (1512–94) was born in Rupelmonde in Flanders (Belgium). His given name was Gerard de Kremer or Cremer. “Mercator,” meaning “merchant,” is a Latinized version of his Flemish last name. He studied philosophy and theology at the University of Leuven, and developed an interest in astronomy and mathematics. He produced his first map, of Palestine, in 1537. He went on to create numerous maps and globes in the course of his long career and is best known for his invention of the Mercator map projection. In 1554 he ...

Adrien-Hubert Brué (1786−1832) was a French geographer and cartographer who as a young man accompanied the explorer Nicolas Baudin on his 1800−1803 voyage to New Holland (Australia). Brué returned to France to become an important geographer, associated with the Institut Geographique de Paris and geographer to the king. His Grand atlas universel (Large universal atlas) was first published in 1816 and issued in revised and updated editions in 1825, 1830, and 1838. Shown here is Brué’s map of the Ottoman Empire in Europe, Greece, and the Ionian ...

This map shows southeastern Europe during the Crimean War (1853−56) that pitted Russia against the Ottoman Empire (Turkey) and its allies Britain, France, and Sardinia. The western European powers backed the Turks in order to block Russia’s expansion into the Black Sea region, which they believed threatened their positions in the Middle East and the Mediterranean. Many of the war’s major battles were fought on the Crimean Peninsula in southern Russia, which, ironically, is not shown on this early map of the “theater of war.” The conflict ...

Shown here is a large folding map produced by the General Staff of the German Army during World War II. Notes on the map indicate that it was solely for use within the army and that reproduction was prohibited. One side is a large map of the region stretching from the Balkan Peninsula to the eastern part of Iran. Shown are towns and cities by population size, international borders, the borders of republics and provinces within the Soviet Union, major and secondary roads, roads under construction, oil pipelines, mountain passes ...

This map shows the expeditions of Alexander the Great (356–323 BC) from the Hellespont, the strait (later called the Dardanelles) that separates Europe from Asia in present-day Turkey, through Turkey, the Levant, Egypt, Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq), Persia (Iran), and Afghanistan. Alexander reached as far as the banks of the Hyphasis River (now known as the Beas River) in northern India, where the conqueror’s exhausted armies finally mutinied. Shown are cities that Alexander founded and named “Alexandria” in honor of himself. Two distance scales are given, the ancient measure ...

Marittima Italiana was an Italian shipping company, established in 1936 as an offshoot of the long-established firm of Lloyd-Triestino, which in the late 1930s operated shipping lines between Italy and east Africa, southern Africa, Asia, and Australia. Shown here is a map of Marittima Italiana’s line from Genoa to Bombay (Mumbai), India. Distances are given for the different sections of the route: from Genoa to Naples, Naples to Port Said, Port Said to Aden, and Aden to Bombay. Inset maps show these five ports and the Suez Canal, with ...

This map shows the Ottoman Empire as it appeared in the early 17th century. It details Ottoman territories in Asia, Africa, and Europe, and includes Persia, Transcaucasia, Ethiopia, and other surrounding lands. Topographic features, place-names, and populations are definitively marked, although the nomenclature of the time differs markedly from that used today. The Red Sea is termed the Sea of Mecca, for example, and the Persian Gulf is called the Sea of Alcatif. The map sometimes has been identified as a part of Atlas sive Cosmographicae Meditationes de Fabrica Mundi ...

This map shows the Ottoman Empire as it was conceived in Europe in the last quarter of the 17th century. It is a reprint, dated 1679, of an earlier edition possibly included in a series of world atlases published by Nicolas Sanson (1600−1667) in the middle of the century. The map shows geological features, such as rivers, deserts, and mountain ranges. Cities and towns are indicated, and colored lines are used to mark the borders of kingdoms. An inset map at the lower left shows the extension of the ...

This four-volume work documents the expedition undertaken in 1837 by the Russian industrialist and philanthropist Anatolii Demidov (1812-70) through southeastern Europe and the southern parts of the Russian Empire. Demidov was accompanied by a team of French scientists, engineers, and artists. The expedition gathered a wealth of information about the geography, history, archaeology, and peoples and cultures of a region still largely unknown to the rest of the world. Denis Auguste Marie Raffet (1804-60), the staff artist of the expedition, produced 64 lithographed plates for the volumes, along with many ...

This early-19th century playing card is from a set of 60 such cards, each devoted to a different province or territory of the Russian Empire, which at the time included the Grand Duchy of Finland, Congress Poland, and Russian America. One side of each card shows the local costume and the provincial coat of arms; the other side contains a map. This card depicts Kherson Province, located in part of present-day Ukraine, and bordered by the Black Sea in the south. Situated on the Dnieper River, Kherson was the administrative ...

This card is one of a souvenir set of 82 illustrated cards–one for each province of the Russian Empire as it existed in 1856. Each card presents an overview of a particular province’s culture, history, economy, and geography. The front of the card depicts such distinguishing features as rivers, mountains, major cities, and chief industries. The back of each card contains a map of the province, the provincial seal, information about the population, and a picture of the local costume of the inhabitants. The province of Bessarabia depicted ...

This early-19th century playing card is from a set of 60 such cards, each devoted to a different province or territory of the Russian Empire, which at the time included the Grand Duchy of Finland, Congress Poland, and Russian America. One side of each card shows the local costume and the provincial coat of arms; the other side contains a map. This card depicts the Bessarabia Province, located in the southwestern part of the empire on territory annexed by Russia from the Ottoman Empire in 1812. Kishinev (Chişinău, in Romanian ...

This 1821 map of Bessarabia is from a larger work, Geographical Atlas of the Russian Empire, the Kingdom of Poland, and the Grand Duchy of Finland (Geograficheskii atlas Rossiiskoi imperii, tsarstva Pol'skogo i velikogo kniazhestva Finliandskogo), containing 61 maps of the Russian Empire. Compiled and engraved by Colonel V.P. Piadyshev, it reflects the detailed mapping carried out by Russian military cartographers in the first quarter of the 19th century. The map shows population centers (five gradations by size), monasteries, custom-houses, postal stations, roads (three types), state provincial borders ...

This report provides an overview of political and economic conditions in Bessarabia (present-day Moldova) in the immediate aftermath of World War I, the Russian Revolution, and the transfer of the province from Russian to Romanian control. The work is by Captain John Kaba, a U.S. Army officer who completed a two-month survey of the province in the spring of 1919 on behalf of the American Relief Administration. Headed by Herbert Hoover, the international mining engineer and future U.S. president who had organized volunteer relief efforts during World War ...

This card is one of a souvenir set of 82 illustrated cards–one for each province of the Russian Empire as it existed in 1856. Each card presents an overview of a particular province’s culture, history, economy, and geography. The front of the card depicts such distinguishing features as rivers, mountains, major cities, and chief industries. The back of each card contains a map of the province, the provincial seal, information about the population, and a picture of the local costume of the inhabitants. Khersonskaia guberniia (Kherson Province) depicted ...

In preparation for the peace conference that was expected to follow World War I, in the spring of 1917 the British Foreign Office established a special section responsible for preparing background information for use by British delegates to the conference. Bessarabia is Number 51 in a series of more than 160 studies produced by the section, most of which were published after the conclusion of the 1919 Paris Peace Conference. At the time this study was written, Bessarabia (in present-day Moldova and Ukraine) was part of the Russian Empire. The ...